                        Astronomy Picture of the Day

    Discover the cosmos! Each day a different image or photograph of our
      fascinating universe is featured, along with a brief explanation
                    written by a professional astronomer.

                                2023 March 30

                        NGC 4372 and the Dark Doodad
                 Image Credit & Copyright: Matias Tomasello

   Explanation: The delightful Dark Doodad Nebula drifts through southern
   skies, a tantalizing target for binoculars toward the small
   constellation Musca, The Fly. The dusty cosmic cloud is seen against
   rich starfields just south of the Coalsack Nebula and the Southern
   Cross. Stretching for about 3 degrees across the center of this
   telephoto field of view, the Dark Doodad is punctuated near its
   southern tip (upper right) by yellowish globular star cluster NGC 4372.
   Of course NGC 4372 roams the halo of our Milky Way Galaxy, a background
   object some 20,000 light-years away and only by chance along our
   line-of-sight to the Dark Doodad. The Dark Doodad's well defined
   silhouette belongs to the Musca molecular cloud, but its better known
   alliterative moniker was first coined by astro-imager and writer Dennis
   di Cicco in 1986 while observing Comet Halley from the Australian
   outback. The Dark Doodad is around 700 light-years distant and over 30
   light-years long.

                    Tomorrow's picture: tantalizing Titan
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